


nothing or beside me

by karples



Category: Nana (Anime & Manga)
Genre: Angst, Canon Compliant, Depression, Drabble Collection, Established Relationship, F/M, Freeform, The Usual Nana Fare: Deep Sadness
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-08-24
Updated: 2019-08-24
Packaged: 2020-09-07 03:08:27
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Major Character Death
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,761
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/20302444
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/karples/pseuds/karples
Summary: Nana sat next to him and pulled her knees to her chest. She wondered if he’d remain forever trapped in this liminal state, adolescent and adult, knowing how to survive but not how to grow old.





	nothing or beside me

**Author's Note:**

> Uploaded in 2016, taken down, reuploaded again. Part of the Great Google Drive Migration. 
> 
> A set of drabbles done in various styles as I attempted to get back into writing :') The last segment is an attempt to mimic the manga chapter opening/ending narrations.
> 
> Title taken from [a set of poems](http://thediagram.com/12_4/xu.html) by Wendy Xu.
> 
> WARNING:  
Ren's death isn't explicitly mentioned, but it's undertone running through the whole fic. Nana's depression also makes an appearance.

Nana wanted to remember him young. Young, violently sad, violently happy. Standing on the seawall with his giant guitar case strapped to his skinny back like a tumorous shoulder blade or a misshapen wing. Wearing platform boots and a smile so unprepared, so unrehearsed, that it seemed effortless. _ Staring’s rude, yanno_, he’d say, or maybe, _ If I’ve got something on my face, just tell me! _ or sometimes, in his strange mature voice, _ Like what you see? _

There was something earnest and uncontainable in Ren, and from it everything burst forth, sheet music and steaming viscera. Even if you hated Ren, you had to admit that he was honest about his music. Not like Takumi, that backstabbing cockroach, or Trapnest rip-offs with no style. Ren only lied about being okay.

*

“You’re on in ten,” called the assistant stage manager. He was a hassled guy with cartilage piercings and a severe blood pressure problem.

“Thank you, ten,” said Yasu, evenly, while Nana languished on the couch and yelled, “Put on a goddamn shirt!”

The assistant stage manager vanished from the doorway. Ren checked his own appearance in bafflement. “You have a problem with my bare chest?” He laid a hand over his heart. “Can’t recognize quality when she sees it...”

Nana jabbed a finger in Ren’s direction. “If you get sick, then who’s gonna play bass??”

“But isn’t the house heated?” Nobu asked, suddenly concerned. “I mean, it’s December--”

“It’s heated,” Yasu confirmed.

“_And _ we’ll sweat under the spots anyway,” Ren drawled, fussing with his studded collar. Nana yanked him closer and fixed it for him. Ren sighed. “So what’s the problem?”

Nana opened her mouth to argue, but Yasu beat her to the punch. “Keep it down, you delinquents,” he said, as if he didn’t look like a mob boss. “They _ say _ that the dressing rooms are soundproofed...”

“...But there’s no guarantee, okay, okay,” said Ren. He pulled a long-suffering face. Contemplative, Nana slid the buckle of Ren’s collar into place.

“You know, this thing’s really worn-out,” she said. “Old.”

Ren eyed her. “It’s got _ history_. Don’t like it, buy me somethin’ new to hang around my neck.”

“Ha! Like a noose?” 

“Pick a pretty one for me?”

The assistant stage manager popped back in. “On deck in five!”

“Thank you, five,” said Yasu. He stood and reached for his drumsticks, the brand name faded and peeling under his steady hands. Nobu whooped and strummed an imaginary guitar before Yasu placed the real instrument in his arms. 

Unhurried, Nana stretched out her legs. Ren was laughing like they were all in on some grand, marvelous secret. As far as Nana was concerned, they weren’t.

“Don’t fuck up too bad,” Ren teased, and Nana showed him her middle finger.

*

The way the album appeared on the shelves, plastic film unopened, back cover facing forward:

TRIGGER

TRACKLIST  
a little pain; Wish; Starless Night; Shadow of Love; Tell me; Rock you; Winter sleep; Recorded Butterflies

Underscored by silver font:

TRAPNEST  
© 20XX Cookie Music.  
The copyright in this sound recording is owned by Cookie Music. All rights reserved. Unauthorized duplication is prohibited. Printed in Japan.

Nana flipped the case over. Spotted the Sid Vicious lock, heavy and gleaming, nestled against photo-Ren’s clavicles. He could’ve cut it off if he wanted to, she thought. He should’ve cut it off. 

Nana didn’t recognize the expression that photo-Ren was wearing. Nana felt as though someone had slit her throat. Nana wanted to sink into the dark infertile soil, never to reemerge.

She didn’t visit the music store for months. Nobu lent her his vinyls and CDs without a word, just like they used to.

*

NARRATOR

It would’ve been easier if you could surrender your voice to whatever winds that swept through your life, carrying away everyone you couldn’t relinquish. You hung on so hard that your nails must’ve carved grooves into them, like canyons and canals, the shallow veins of vinyl records. Left with no companions, no better angels besides yourself and your pistol mouth, you fired each shot into the future, hoping that its trajectory would bring it to the bullseye. What did you expect after you emptied your chambers? The only bullet certain to land is one from a barrel pointed at your own head. 

You transplanted yourself from one hemisphere to another, bleached your hair in the sink, but you’re no chameleon, Nana. You’re only a human, perhaps cold, perhaps selfish. Deathshrouded in the lowlight of the club where you sing in the evenings, and sometimes the measured indigo throb of the bassline is almost enough to convince you that your heart’s still beating.

*

“Ow ow ow!” Ren hissed like a cat and batted her away. “_Ow_, Nana...”

Nana brandished the bottle of rubbing alcohol. “You pierced yourself full of holes, and you can’t handle _ this_?”

“One is pain in the pursuit of beauty, the other’s just pain.”

Nana gave an indelicate snort and prodded at the cuts on Ren’s arm with a cotton swab. “Done. Properly disinfected. Wasn’t that hard, was it?”

“Ack, _ Nana_...” Ren playfully wrestled his bicep from her grip, and Nana was swamped by a vague sense of guilt. She rummaged through their first-aid kit and, discovering it understocked, withdrew and tossed two condoms onto the bedsheets.

“Not a single bandage!” Nana threw her hands into the air. 

Ren was examining a foil with interest. “So _ that’s _ where they went...”

“Who put them there if you didn’t?” Nana demanded.

Indulgent, Ren drew her in, pressing his chapped mouth to her temple, her cheek, her jaw. “Don’t know. ‘S not important.”

Nana folded her arms over her breasts. Her exposed skin prickled into gooseflesh. The renovated warehouse was silent but for the crash of waves, muffled by the snowstorm, and the dry static sparking in the linen. 

Ren spoke. Soft, hushed, a murmur. “Must’ve been a bad nightmare... You’ve never scratched so hard before.”

“I’ll cut my nails,” Nana deflected. Something dense inside of her, something that she wanted to excise, sank like a stone. “I don’t remember what happened anymore.”

“Mmmm.” Ren breathed into her hair. “Wanna try sleeping again?”

Nana paused, then nodded. The residual fear saran-wrapped her mind, permeated every thought. It occurred to her that such feelings, much like people, could exist without reason, without purpose. It bothered her. It hadn’t before.

“Don’t--don’t go to work in the morning,” she mumbled. “Stay in.”

“Okay,” Ren promised, unhesitating. He eased her under the blankets. The first-aid kit clattered to the floor. She held his hand to her belly, and the individual links in his necklace were like chips of ice against her back.

“Easy, Nana. I’ve got you.”

*

They weren’t speaking, and not entirely for lack of trying. Nana made her trademark miso soup as a conciliatory gesture; Ren washed her back in the shower, careful, meticulous, as he always was. They didn't touch beyond that--neither was in the mood for sex--but still. Nana stared at the water sluicing over the pale tiles, cemented and content in their respective places, and thought that perhaps it would have been better if they’d fucked. Some semblance of closeness, even away from the cameras.

Their attempts at conversation waned when the second typhoon hit, once again confining them to the same deluxe suite. Ren didn’t dare play his guitar the first time that Nana snapped at him, citing a headache. She was lying, of course--wrapped up in a sour, obstinate mood. She dragged it around like a shadow sewn into her feet. Everything Ren played sounded like Trapnest, songs written for Reira’s voice.

Five hours later, Ren started playing again. Nana slammed a door. Ren shouted, “Weren’t you the one who said we needed lives outside of each other??” 

The storm battered the windows. Nana bit her knuckle and slept alone and wished that she could be kinder, simpler, less petulant and proud. Wished that Hachi were here.

She made another batch of conciliatory miso the next morning. They exchanged a few curt, stilted words: 

_ Thanks for the soup. _

_ Yeah. _

_ Going out? _

_ Yeah. _

_ When? _

_ Dunno, when are you going? _

_ How'd you guess? _

_ It's not like either of us wanna be near each other, Ren. _

Leaning back, Ren set down his bowl and laced his hands over his stomach. His expression was tight, strained. He was still wearing his ring.

_ Forget it, Nana, let’s not fight... Let’s just remember that we had a few days with each other, okay? I feel like we’ll want to keep that. _

* 

Once, Nana found Ren napping in Nobu’s room, left hand curled over the frets of his guitar. A nicotine kiss mottled the spot between his index and middle finger, faint and yellow.

Nana sat next to him and pulled her knees to her chest. She wondered if he’d remain forever trapped in this liminal state, adolescent and adult, knowing how to survive but not how to grow old. His forehead was still smooth in sleep. He’d passed out with his leather jacket bunched under one ear, chin tucked in. He wouldn’t let go of his precious guitar pick. He clung to it as if it pinned him to earth.

Ren complained nonstop when he woke up: _ My neck huuurts, why didn’t you move me, spare me some pain, _ to which Nana retorted, _ What am I, your mom? _ And Ren joked, _ Like I know what that’s like, you cold-hearted... _

Eventually Nana admitted that he’d been too heavy for her to budge, _ So shut up and leave me alone! _Not that she wanted him to, not that she meant it. In retrospect, she never really put her foot down if it was about Ren. Only about Trapnest and Tokyo, when she withheld the one thing that she could keep from them both. She’d wanted a future of her own, too. But even that, now, felt far away.

*

_ This town on the English coastline reminds me of the one where I was born, except for the flowers. The flowers are different in England. As a teenager, I thought that nothing could grow in my hometown. Not even the plants, the people, could take root. _

_ But Ren did, didn’t he? In that cold wasteland? It must not have been as bleak as I remember it, because I keep wishing to return to it. The warehouse where we lived, Nobu’s family inn. The dark cluttered club where BLAST debuted. My grandmother’s house. _

_ Funny how everything seems so sad, so impossible, when you think back on it, Hachi. Yes; even times and places where we were, long ago, happy. _


End file.
